


Nightlight

by allthoselittlemusings



Category: Wentworth (TV)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Femslash, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-31
Updated: 2020-01-04
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:20:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22041712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/allthoselittlemusings/pseuds/allthoselittlemusings
Summary: Bridget finally discovers the real reason Vera's always making up the spare bed.
Relationships: Vera Bennett/Bridget Westfall
Comments: 6
Kudos: 26





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Obviously AU and it's no Fridget or Freakytits but hopefully still a fun pairing to read about. Set somewhere after Season 5. Jake is still a snake but Vera isn't pregnant and Bridget and Franky have broken up.

The first time Bridget thinks so little of it.

She’s had too much wine – again. Again it’s at Vera’s house and again it’s compensation. Overcompensation, in fact. She’s lonely. So, so lonely.

Vera has more self control that night. She drains her merlot from the half-glass. Even though Bridget knows that their careful dynamic has long consisted of the forensic psychologist anchoring the Governor in times of need - that evening, in the middle of a freezing Melbourne winter - Bridget's the one who has come knocking. Vera's home, although devoid of certain personal touches - photo frames, birthday cards - still isn't Bridget's. It doesn't conjure memories of a certain headstrong brunette, muscled and inked, sprawled naked on her living room floor, or sauntering around the kitchen with that sexy, self-assured grin.

“I’ll just shower” Vera murmurs, pulling Bridget from a dangerous trip down the rabbit-hole and gripping her shoulder comfortingly as she rises from the couch. On her way through the kitchen she switches on the hot water jug. It's a sure sign that she won't be underfilling her wine glass again. Bridget nonetheless moves to the wine rack, pores over the collection – mostly reds. She notes a dusty bottle of Dom Perignon in the corner. A celebratory drink. But what has Vera ever had to celebrate really?

It’s a miserable thought and it sits like a weight on her shoulders. Her mind drifts briefly to Franky, but she can't afford to toe that line. She instead chooses a bottle of pinot, rifles through a few drawers until she locates a single bottle opener. They make a good pair.

When Vera comes out wrapped in a dressing gown, their careful dynamic switches instantly. Bridget, unashamed of her sexuality and brimming with renewed liquid courage, stares without remorse. Vera has shaken free the shackles of a tough day in the office; her baby face is smoother, sweeter. The lines around her eyes have softened and her cheeks are flushed from the steam. She says nothing about the second bottle of red uncorked, but she fills her mug of chamomile and re-fills Bridget’s glass. Then she settles back on the couch - a little softer, a little shyer - than when she left.

For a few moments Bridget can do nothing but continue with the visual assault. She’s beautiful, Vera Bennett, in her own unassuming way. More than once lately the blonde has found herself noticing those perpetually chapped lips, or staring with adoration at the wispy ringlets that fall from her bun at the end of the day, despite her best attempts. In fact, she's been forced to concede that maybe she does have the slightest soft spot for the sheer unsophistication of Vera Bennett, whose very nature sits in such stark contrast to the all the popular, painted girls she's fucked.

She's watched Vera carefully since the days of their fledgling friendship; watched her try to navigate the complexities of human relationships while struggling under the crushing weight of residual emotional trauma. A mere child in an adult world. Emotionally stunted. Socially undeveloped. There were a myriad of terms Bridget could apply. But Vera wasn't a case study. Bridget didn't need to analyse the white crocheted doilies on tables or the stack of Barry Manilow CD, to understand that Vera couldn't quite shed the memory of her mother. She didn't need to see the bloodied tissues in the bathroom bin to know that Vera's anxiety-induced nosebleeds had come back with a vengeance since Ferguson had delivered her ultimate blow.

In fact, she cares only that Vera is, at her core, the very definition of compassion. It was that compassion, so dangerous amongst the malice and the spite of Wentworth, that had turned her into a little lamb, ripe for the slaughter. And hadn't she been slaughtered.

“Vera, I’m so, so sorry about Jake” the blonde feels like she needs to say it. They're facing each other now on the old fabric couch, knees almost touching and Bridget needs Vera to understand that she's not here to take advantage of her like Jake did. She's not a vampire.

Vera’s head dips. Small shoulders sag and mousy curls obscure her face. Bridget can sense the regret, the sadness, and she curses inwardly. She should have said nothing – it had only been a few weeks. Vera suddenly looks extra small nestled in the too-big robe and Bridget feels a surge of maternity, only stoked further by the Governor raising her head to reveal welling in her gray-blue eyes.

_Oh Vera. Don’t._

Bridget can’t help it. She can’t stand Vera’s fragility. As a psychologist she knows the boundaries, as a companion she conveniently crosses them. She reaches out to cup a cheek, and then takes a hand, warmed from the mug, and turns it over in her own.

“He’s an idiot”

“An idiot for getting involved with Ferguson?” the tiny brunette sniffles, button nose reddening. The tears are only just being held at bay through madly fluttering eyelashes.

“An idiot for choosing her over you” Bridget knows her remaining self-control will be gone if Vera loses complete composure.

“I was never enough...I am never enough” it sounded like a concession, an ode to inadequacy, and one that the psychologist was not going to let the self-deprecating brunette get away with.

“No. You _are_ enough, sweetheart.” Now Bridget knows it’s not just the wine talking. She truly aches in the presence of Vera’s hurt, truly despises Jake for contributing to this perceived unworthiness. She's never seen such insecurity in Vera's eyes and she realises that this very issue has been gnawing at her for weeks.

_Sweet Vera. You are more than enough._

In her wine-muddled mind, it seems like the only way to prove her point. Bridget leans forward, pausing only to make sure Vera isn't poised to flee, and places the softest of kisses on Vera's lips, then her forehead, and then back to her lips. She expects that to be it. A small gesture to convince her friend that she wasn't unlovable or altogether repulsive.

But Vera, sweet Vera, kisses her back. Maybe she feels obligated, or maybe in her world of complete social distortion she thinks it’s the right thing to do. Whichever it is, it results in a sheepish tongue parting Bridget's lips and running itself along a set of pearly white teeth. Herbal tea and sugar and red wine mix. Vera sucks at Bridget's bottom lip almost desperately, leaning in, moving her hand to the front of Bridget’s silk blouse, untucking it from the tailored pants, grazing the skin on her hip.

When Bridget pulls back abruptly she’s unsurprised by Vera’s face – diffident, ashamed of her lack of self-control. She’d only just built up the walls again, and here she was, so quickly giving them away to someone who, up until just a few weeks ago, had been in a relationship with an inmate in her care.

If it’s apprehension that plagues the vulnerable woman before her, it’s guilt that floods Bridget. She'd only wanted Vera to think she could be loved. Or had she? Was it the wine, or was it that she was, in truth, enchanted by the fragile woman with her nervous lip chew and damp lashes?

It hardly matters now. Vera is trying to look anywhere that isn't at Bridget. Bridget is trying to find her phone in her handbag. She prays there's an Uber close. It's one thirty. She needs to sit under a cold shower and remember why she shouldn't drink.

"I'll get going"

“Bridget stay – please. It's late. Please” the careful dynamic shifts again. Vera is suddenly the voice of reason. Her hands are taking her phone from her, setting it down, removing the last of the pinot that Bridget definitely does not need. Not waiting for an answer.

She'll stay at Vera’s behest, but only Vera's. It seems the Governor wants to be well rid of the awkwardness of the previous moment as well. Bridget stuffs her hands in her pockets while Vera pours her a large glass of water and then numbly follows her down the hallway. At the last minute, Vera makes a sharp turn towards her linen cupboard and pulls a towel from the middle shelf, aptly labelled with peeling paper tape; 'GUESTS'. Very Rita Bennett-esque, Bridget muses.

The Governor does all the things a good friend should do - she locates clean trackies and an oversized shirt in Bridget's size, presses a spare toothbrush into her palm. Bridget lingers idly in the doorway of Vera's bedroom, wondering briefly if the still-made up side of the queen bed is hers. But then Vera pushes her lightly across the hallway and into the spare room, throws a comforter on the bed. She shows her how to work the heating, mumbles something about an extra blanket in the linen cupboard if she can't get warm. Bridget just nods. The wine is wearing off and she just wants to sleep.

"Goodnight Bridget" Vera moves, almost close enough to kiss her cheek, but at the last minute she jerks away and places a hand on Bridget's forearm instead. "Sleep well"

Bridget is left alone with her thoughts.


	2. Chapter 2

The second time Bridget is a little more cluey. 

Vera has called her. There's a tiredness in her voice, but it's not a physical one. Bridget can hear the slightest tremble of emotion, a little hitch of a breath as she asks for Bridget's company. The blonde is already searching for her car keys. 

She knocks on Vera's door at 8:00pm sharp, holding up a bottle of young Bordeaux; a slightly more expensive drop than the pinot she'd opened at Vera's without permission a few weeks before. It's a peace offering, and Vera accepts with a soft sigh. She's dressed down - black jeans that are too big for her gangly legs, an orange patterned blouse and a mismatched blue cardigan that dwarfs her bent frame. She's lifted the small amount of makeup she dons for work from her pale cheeks, exposing the inflamed skin under her eyes. Bridget can't work out whether she looks older than her early forty-something years or just young. Very, very young. She gazes at Bridget with a pleading in her eyes and a soft lower lip bite and Bridget melts all over again. 

"What's happened?" she follows Vera into the kitchen where the brunette starts hurriedly locating a bottle opener like her very sanity depends on it. Bridget notices that there's already two glasses set down on the bench. She's about to mention to Vera that they should probably pop the wine into a decanter for a bit, but then Vera finds the corkscrew and jams it so savagely into the top of the bottle that Bridget bites her tongue. 

Vera fills the two glasses almost to the top and this time Bridget can't hide an eyebrow raise. 

"Should I... put out some cheese?"  
"If you want" Vera answers dismissively, gesturing towards the fridge before she takes a too-big swig of the wine. Now Bridget is concerned. 

"Vera, can you tell me what's wrong?"   
"Nothing"   
"Did something happen at work?" she coaxes gently. 

Vera sets the glass down and presses two fingers to her furrowed brow, sighing in anguish. 

"Nothing's _happened._ I just..." the truth was she'd seen Jake in medical pounding away at Nurse Radcliffe like a sex-starved teenager and it had sliced an old wound open. She didn't much care for Jake, but that old taunt of her mother's; _some girls can wear make up, some can't_ \- had been doing laps in her brain ever since, because she looked nothing like the blonde bombshell with the smokey eyes and blood red lips. She chooses not to go into such detail with Bridget.

"...I just didn't want to be alone tonight" 

Bridget doesn’t press again. Whatever particulars had set Vera off, her meek admission was enough. She would sit in silence all night if that's what Vera needed. 

_________________________________________________________________________________________  
  


She hadn't expected Vera to stop at one bottle, but didn't think they would get to a third. She's lost count of how many times she's waved Vera's hand away from her glass only to watch the Governor give herself a generous top-up. Their conversation has slowed in pace with Vera's level of intoxication and finally Bridget can see two delicate eyelids struggling to stay open. It's not yet half-ten. Bridget fakes a yawn.   
"Bedtime I think" she murmurs

"No - no, I'm awake, I'm -" Bridget watches as Vera balls up her fists and rubs her eyes with a vengeance, leaving raw skin in her wake. For a few seconds she stares intently at the blonde with comically widened eyes, as if trying to prove a point. But almost as quickly the gray-blues glaze over, eyelashes flutter and the droop returns. Bridget feels a familiar pang of adoration- she's reminded of an overtired toddler trying to convince their parents to give them another half an hour of playtime. 

"I'm going to help you to bed, sweetheart" she removes the wine glass with the same firmness that Vera had removed hers a few weeks before, takes Vera's cold hand in hers to help her up from the couch. The brunette whines, gives Bridget dead weight, but she's easily stronger than the waify woman and finds she can guide Vera with nothing more than a light hand on the small on her back despite the unsteady legs.

They pause at Vera’s bedroom door.

“Would you like me to stay?” Bridget offers, nothing more than a feeble attempt to assuage her guilt. She has, after all, let Vera get near legless in her presence. The least she can do is make sure her friend doesn’t pass out on her bedroom floor, or spend the night heaving red wine up on white porcelain.

Vera drunkenly nods her assent. She’s leaning heavily into Bridget’s body now and Bridget is trying to quell the feeling in her chest. She recognises it; that growing tenderness towards the woman she barely noticed when she was with Franky. She cares about Vera's wellbeing like any friend would, but then there's something else; something about the combination of Vera's fragility and the scent of her floral shampoo.

"Come on - bed" Bridget pushes open the door, anchors Vera to her side so she can't fall, and crosses the threshold into her bedroom. It should be a liberating moment, a small way to dishonour the memory of Jake. Bridget so desperately wants to hold Vera's space for as long as she needs it; to help her erase any reminder of her recent betrayal. She's not prepared for the brunette to stiffen in her arms.

"No!" Vera exclaims suddenly. She tenses, wriggles. Bridget lets her go, at once worried that she feels trapped instead of supported.

"No?" Bridget so rarely misreads situations, and she's sure she hasn't misread this one. 

"No you have to stheep - sleep in the spare room" there's almost a panic in Vera's voice. "I put on stheets"

The lisp that Bridget only hears when Vera is particularly stressed spills forth with a speckle of spit. Before Bridget can get her head around such a stark change in her friend's demeanour, Vera is lurching forward to try to push the blonde out. Bridget winces when she misjudges the doorway and collides with the wooden frame. Her tiny body is jolted backwards. She tries again, this time hitting the opposite side with her upper arm. 

"Okay, okay. I'll sleep in the spare room, I promise" Bridget throws her hands up in mock defeat, if nothing but to stop Vera's body from having to endure any more bruising than it already had. Vera calms at the white flag. 

"Comforter... cupboard" she hiccups. Bridget nods, a hand reaching towards Vera's in trepidation, fingertips barely brushing. It's a small gesture. She's not mad. She wants Vera to know that. 

"I know, I know. I'll get the comforter" Bridget assures her, closing the door over as she leaves. The last thing she hears is Vera's bed groan as she hits it with - Bridget imagines - all of her fifty-something kilos. It's a small comfort. 

Bridget lies awake for a long time. 


	3. Chapter 3

The third time Bridget's curiosity gets the better of her. 

It's a Friday night. July. The temperature has dropped again. A misty winter rain obscures Bridget's vision as she navigates through the backstreets of Footscray. The short walk to Vera's front door chills her.

Vera hasn't shed her uniform yet. The navy blazer sits starched across her skinny shoulders. A tiny drop of dried blood on the crisp white collar betrays her mental state. Bridget reaches out and brushes a thumb over the material. 

"Tough week?" 

Vera nods. Averts her eyes. Curls her lower lip up. Bridget still notices the skin around her nostrils - red raw, as if wiped over and over. Her heart throbs dangerously. Clearly that day's nosebleed hadn't been an isolated incident. 

Bridget tells Vera to change. She's come in trackies and a hoodie, too tired and too cold to bother with her usual combination of sharp cut slacks and a stylish blouse. She tells her not to bother cooking. Does she have cinnamon sticks and brandy? She'll make mulled wine while Vera's in the shower. They'll order pizza. Watch a movie. Something normal for once. A proper girl's night in. 

Vera plays with her bottom lip while Bridget talks. Her only blueprint for a girl's night is what she's seen on TV; toenail painting, hair braiding, gossiping about girls not fortunate enough to score an invite. Girls like Vera. A part of her still questions why Bridget has invited herself over. The psychologist walks with the confidence of someone whose never been short of a girl's night to attend. 

Vera doesn't move immediately, self-doubt crippling her. When she's particularly tired and anxious, every interaction seems saturated in memories of Rita Bennett's cruelness. The birthday party she cancelled, the party dress that went to waste, the naivety of 9-year-old Vera truly believing that the same girls who got to braid each other's hair would have come to her pony party anyway. 

"Something up in that pretty head?" Vera has been lost for a second too long. Bridget is observing her with the kindest concern. It abates some of the uncertainty. 

"No - I - the spices are in the pantry. I'll um, shower" 

_____________________________________________________________

The rain gets steadily heavier. Bridget turns the heat up more than once while Vera's in the shower. She pours two mugs of the mulled wine - hopes she hasn't been too heavy-handed with the brandy - garnishes them with an orange slice and then settles on the leather couch under a gray throw rug, marvelling at how quickly Vera's house has started to feel like a home. She throws her hoodie on the back of the couch, lets the heater warm her bare shoulders. 

When the brunette emerges, Bridget again lets her eyes roam unapologetically. She can't ignore the flutter in her stomach, nor does she want to. There's something both habitual and incredibly intimate about seeing Vera in her pyjamas - those plaid pink and green flanelettes, the mismatched blue cotton shirt under the knitted robe. And socks. Pink bed socks with monkeys on them. Bridget lifts the throw rug and Vera climbs in with an adorable lack of grace. The blonde has to resist the urge to just wrap her up straight away. 

The have to log in to Bridget's Netflix account. Vera doesn't have one.

"No one to watch it with" she muses. It breaks Bridget's heart. The movie is nothing to write home about, but they do move steadily closer and it's not just because of the cold. Bridget stretches out, her body language is comfortable, open. Vera isn't completely relaxed, but when is she ever? She plays with her lips, with her nails, with the v-neck of her robe. Bridget notices but doesn't pull her up. 

Finally the credits roll and the conversation turns to work. Jake's continued presence in the prison is shaking Vera's resolve. 

"I liked the idea of him" she admits softly, slightly tipsy from the mix of wine and brandy. The truth was, everyone else had been in love, she thought she should have been too. She would never admit it to Bridget, but the image of her dancing around her living room with Franky, radiating happiness, had haunted her. She'd wanted that. Maybe she'd wanted it with Bridget. 

"God, I really fucked things up" the hand that's been toying with the v-neck moves to cover her eyes, as if the world won't look unkindly on her if she doesn't look at it. 

"Jake made his own choices, sweetie" they've moved so close that Bridget can tuck away the mousy brown curl that's fallen loose from Vera's low pony, the solitary victim of a defeated shake of her head. 

"I should have known" Rita Bennett's jibes turn to the Freak's: _deep down you know a man like Jake could never love you._ She speaks it aloud without realising. Bridget shakes her head. They're right back where they were a few weeks ago - with the psychologist trying gently to ease her friend's vicious self-degradation. 

"I could love you" Bridget answers softly and when Vera looks up, she meets a piercing blue stare. Unabashed. Honest. 

It seems the brunette hasn't forgotten the order of events from a few weeks previous either. This time she instigates it, pressing dry lips to the corner of Bridget's mouth. When she pulls back Bridget sees the familiar search for validation in her eyes. The blonde leans back in. 

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

They kiss again and again. For the second time, Vera loses control. She thrusts her tongue around awkwardly, forgetting all the practice she's had with the mirror or the back of her hand. It's nothing like that, really. Bridget is slow and soft - and _safe._ Vera lets her through the armour she's encased herself in since Ferguson's coup de grace. She lets Bridget untangle her robe, lets her hand under the hem of her pyjama top to trace her bare rib while their tongues wrestle. She lets her own breath quicken and her cheeks flush. 

When it's over it becomes fight or flight. She doesn't know what to say. 

"Do I have pizza breath?" she mumbles shyly, and then curses herself. This is such unfamiliar territory that she can't find her footing. After the showdown with Ferguson, the fear of being judged, mocked, is paramount. 

Bridget sees it. Vera is terrified. She touches her reddening cheek.

"You have brandy breath. My fault" the blonde soothes and then kisses her fully again, burying a hand in her soft curls. To her dismay, Vera's body responds in the same way it did with Jake. She reaches a palm out and it collides with Bridget's breast where a nipple is straining against the fabric of her thin singlet. Bridget smiles encouragingly against her mouth, uses her free hand to tug on the string of Vera's pyjama bottoms, loosening the elastic from her scrawny waist. 

_We laugh at how pathetic you are. Especially in the bedroom._ The sudden memory cuts Vera like a knife. She jolts away as if burned. Bridget freezes, concerned. 

"Vera? Honey?" 

She can feel the heat start creeping up her neck. Her eyes flood and she tries to hold her face taut. It's the bottom lip wobble that so often gives her away. Bridget will be angry, or maybe she'll laugh. She prays for the earth to swallow her whole. 

“I’ve never... I’ve not...”

"Oh, sweetheart" Bridget untangles her hand from Vera's unkempt hair, taking with it stray strands of mousy brown. Despite her distress, she feels the loss of contact deeply, misses the small comfort that came with having her plain hair so tenderly threaded through like it was worthy of attention. She expects Bridget to move away, to let the brunette melt into her own humiliation and then carefully reconstruct her walls, but then two fingers lift her quivering chin. 

"We don't have to do anything you're not comfortable with. We don't have to do anything at all." 

Vera, against her better judgment, steals a look at Bridget's face and finds she believes her. Those powder blue orbs are sparkling with genuineness. She doesn't at all inconvenienced. 

"But I am comfortable with you - here, now. I am... I just..." Vera's voice is pitchy, panicked. She has initiated the contact this time, in a moment of misplaced confidence. Despite her inexperience, she knows that nights like this were meant to end with passionate abandon in the bedroom, and yet she'd never been intimate with another woman. She curses her own stupidity.

"Vera, calm down honey" Bridget seems unperturbed that the night is no longer moving towards lovemaking. She doesn't scoff or smirk. She nods in understanding at Vera's pathetic attempt to explain and then she reaches gently for the Governor's cheek to catch a stray tear falling without permission. 

"If you're comfortable here we can just cuddle on the couch" Bridget's tone is a gentle alternative to Vera's near-hysterical one, as if she recognises the heightened emotions and wants to bring them down a level. The blonde stretches out, legs on either side of Vera's small body, leans back against the arm of the sofa and pats the exposed skin on her upper torso. "If you want to you can come here"

Vera doesn't want to show relief. In her experience any outward display of a cheerful emotion was dangerous because she wasn't meant to be happy. Still, she accepts, resting her damp cheek on Bridget's collarbone, sniffling with pity. It's almost a kangaroo cuddle - skin to skin. The kind that helped newborn babies thrive. Maybe that was the reason for her small stature and precarious emotional state - a failure to thrive. Perhaps she needed one of those volunteers who cradled the abandoned babies at the hospital. 

The thought makes her cry properly. Before Bridget can register her surprise, she's spilling forth her fears in a sob-infused babble. The words are muffled by Bridget's chest. Liquid trails into her cleavage. The blonde says nothing. She just rubs circles on the soft skin that encases Vera's too-skinny ribcage under the material of her cotton bed shirt. She's even more determined now to slowly but surely undo the years of neglect. 

____________________________________________________________________________________________

Vera falls asleep first. The moment the tiny hiccups are replaced by even breathing, Bridget lets herself relax. For the first time she can gaze upon the little brunette unheeded. There's a small scar on her lined forehead that Bridget hasn't noticed before, a couple of moles dot the otherwise unmarred skin on her neck. Unable to resist, she smoothes out the crows feet at the edge of Vera's right eye and watches with a small smile as her congested nose twitches in response. 

_I'm falling for you, Vera Bennett._

She drifts in and out of sleep for a few hours. Occasionally, Vera will fidget in her arms or mumble something indiscernible, and Bridget will hold her a little more tenderly, or brush a few more fuzzy strands from her face. She's just shut her eyes again when Vera wakes for real. 

"Bridge. Bridget" she mumbles, and Bridget can feel stiff eyelashes flutter on her chest. 

"Hmm?" 

"I didn't brush my teeth" Vera's voice is slurred but Bridget picks up the alarm in it and understands immediately; it's Vera's aversion to change, her fear at disrupting such a careful nighttime routine. Vera Bennett didn't just fall asleep on the couch without locking the front kitchen window, dead-bolting the door and spending exactly 134 seconds brushing her teeth. Bridget releases her grip, suppressing a sigh. There's no point telling Vera to let it go - she's already scrambling up with a purpose, tightening the gray knit around her. The moment is lost. 

Just before she disappears around the loungeroom door, though, Vera turns back. 

"Bridget. Thanks" her voice is more awake now, but heavy with emotion. Her face is still shiny, flushed. Bridget yearns to have her back. 

"You don't need to thank me" She hasn't moved from the couch. She can still feel Vera's body pressed to hers. She doesn't want to forget. 

"I made up...." 

"The spare bed, I know" she answers. 

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The rain hasn't stopped. Bridget estimates it must be in its eighth hour by now. Her phone screen reads 3:24am. She switches off the heater, pours herself a generous glass of water, drinks it in the kitchen and then pours another. She can hear Vera finish up in the bathroom, flick the light switch. She supposes she should brush her teeth too. 

The hallway is freezing, not having had the benefit of preheating. Bridget winces at the cold tiles on the bathroom floor, forgoes washing her face and does a sub-standard job on her teeth just to get back into warmth. When she exits she realises that Vera has left her bedroom door ajar. Orange light is spilling into the hall. Bridget knows she shouldn't, but she tells herself that the whole episode on the sofa had ended so abruptly, and with Vera's anxiety returning, that she would be a bad friend if she didn't at least make sure she was okay. 

_Curiosity killed the cat, Westfall._

In truth, she's jealous. She knows that Jake got to occupy the space next to Vera in bed and now it feels like that utter waste of a man is privy to something that she's not. She can't, even with her years of psychology training, understand how the Governor could continue to invite her over, kiss her, let herself be held, and then near banish the blonde to the impersonal spare room night after night. Hadn't she made it clear that she would never force Vera into anything she didn't want to do? Did Vera not trust her? 

The questions eat at her. She tiptoes to Vera's door, able to observe quietly without alerting the brunette to her presence. She almost just interrupts to ask her directly, but Vera appears to be on autopilot. Methodically she removes her watch, placing it on a jewellery plate on the nightstand, next to a stuffed Paddington Bear toy. She pats down the comforter, plumps the pillows, finds the lamp switch - the source of the orange glow - and flicks it off. Immediately the room fills with a different light - this time a white blue. Bridget realises that a nightlight has come on in the far corner. It keeps the room well lit. 

_Nyctophobia._

Convinced that she's found the issue, Bridget moves to knock on the wooden frame to reveal herself, already rehearsing a spiel about how many adults were, in truth, afraid of the dark. But then Vera springs upright again. She locates the lamp switch and flicks it back on. The nightlight, sensing it isn't needed, goes dark. Bridget thinks she's been sprung, good and proper and she waits for Vera to turn and discover her betrayal. But all the brunette does is bend her lanky body over the side of the bed and peer under it, checking left and right with the tips of her hair brushing the floor. When she's convinced the two square metre space is void of monsters, she rises again, flicks off the lamp and brings the comforter up and over her eyes. The nightlight flickers back on. 

_Oh, Vera._


End file.
